


I'm Just Your Problem

by alrightginger, womeninthesequel



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: F/F, Female James Potter, In Which We Are Basically Ice King, Inspired by 'What Was Missing' Episode, Inspired by Adventure Time, Room of Requirement Shenanigans, Universe Alteration, ginger in the sequel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-17
Updated: 2018-10-17
Packaged: 2019-08-03 08:15:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,153
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16322561
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alrightginger/pseuds/alrightginger, https://archiveofourown.org/users/womeninthesequel/pseuds/womeninthesequel
Summary: When Lily lowers her hand, it’s difficult to hide her new smile. “You don’t have to come along with me.”“Of course I do,” says Jamie, rolling her eyes. She’s leaning against a wall in a way that’s far more casual than Lily could ever hope to be. “I’ve come this far.”





	I'm Just Your Problem

**Author's Note:**

  * For [a_c0llecti0n_0f_n0nsense](https://archiveofourown.org/users/a_c0llecti0n_0f_n0nsense/gifts).



> When a great idea strikes you at night, you co-write a fic in a day. It’s just what you do.
> 
> Ten points to your Hogwarts house for every Adventure Time reference pointed out in the comments.

Jamie doesn’t notice the chaos at first. 

She doesn’t notice _any_ noise, really, thanks to a carefully placed Muffliato Charm around her bed as she’s happily munching the head off a chocolate frog and plotting her next prank that’s bound to get all of seventh year out of classes for the remainder of the week. 

But she does notice the book that hits her square in the head, knocking her glasses completely off her face in the process. 

“What the fuck!” 

Her mother would say - _has_ said - that her cursing isn’t _ladylike._ That it’s unbecoming of a young girl such as herself, who is nearly about to graduate Hogwarts. Who will be entering a world where she will be judged by the height of her heel rather than the might of her wand. 

Her father would say that they haven’t been raising a lady in a long time. 

Jamie doesn’t have much time to ponder the appropriate placement of her cursing when she opens the curtains to her bed and sees Lily Evans tossing about nearly everything she owns from her trunk. She doesn’t have much time to think about anything _other_ than Lily Evans lately. 

Not that she tells anyone that. _Especially_ not Lily. Telling a girl that you like her only makes you look like an idiot. Especially when you’re also a girl.

Even if, once upon a time, she was certain that Lily liked her back.

Was nearly _positive_ that Lily liked her back, after a night of wandering around the castle led to a bottle of firewhiskey and _everything_ that followed immediately afterwards. 

All of that ceased about two months ago, the day afterthe Firewhiskey Incident, as Jamie now refers to it inside her own head. 

And, now, Jamie isn’t sure whattheir current state is. 

Roommates, friends... fellow scholars? She snorts at the last one.

No matter what they are, Jamie can’t keep herself from intervening when Lily is so clearly in a state. 

“Oi!”Jamie cries, lifting her charm with a simple wave of her wand. “Alright, Evans? You nearly took my eye out, you know.” She tosses the book back towards the girl - not before catching the title of _Emma_ displayed across the cover - and watches, half impressed, as Lily catches it with ease. Lily has always had impressive reflexes. It’s just a shame she can’t get a broom off the ground, thinks Jamie.

Lily lifts a wrinkled note so a glance of parchment makes itself visible in the moonlight. Her question is something of a shouted whisper as she cuts a short glance over to the closed curtains of their sleeping roommates. “Know something about this, Potter?”

“About what? I’m lucky to know my own name after the spine of that book smacked me on the head.” 

Lily doesn’t take the bait, which Jamie feels pathetic for placing in the first place. She curses her own desire for any sort of attention from Lily. Even if it’s sympathy. _Especially_ if it’s sympathy. Jamie wrinkles her nose in self-disgust and holds out her hand. “Hand it here, then. Let me see what it is.”

Standing up from her cross-legged position on the floor, Lily crosses to Jamie’s bed in a few steps. Jamie tries not to think about how close they are and instead focuses on the note. 

Lily answers shortly, “Some kind of joke.” There’s a definite edge to her words that makes them sound something like an accusation. 

“What do you mean joke - oh hell,” grumbles Jamie, taking in the familiar handwriting scribbled on the parchment. “This isn’t a joke. This is Sirius Black.”

Lily snatches the note back from her and flips it over, possibly looking for additional clues. Perhaps a signature. Which would honestly be so Sirius. She looks back up at Jamie. “And you didn’t…?” It’s dark, so she can’t be sure, but Jamie would almost swear that Lily is _blushing._ It’s only for a moment, though, before Lily’s eyes take on a more familiar gleam. “Do you know what it means?”

“It means,” says Jamie, bouncing on the balls of her feet, “that he’s taken _whatever_ it is that you’re missing and has hidden it in the room of hidden things.”

“Then I have to find it!” she replies, voice raised. Lily must notice her change in volume, since she casts another worried look across the room. Without another word, she goes back to her own bed and shuffles around in the darkness until she manages to light the tip of her wand. 

“Alright, alright,” says Jamie, hands raised. She knows enough about Lily to know that she’s hardheaded. Whateverit is that Jamie’s dolt of a best mate has stolen is apparently important enough to go looking for at nearly midnight. “Just - give me a minute to get my things. I’m going with you.” 

Lily turns her head toward her sharply, called to attention. “No!” she says, alert. “I mean…” Jamie sees the moment when she tries to take it back. “It’s late. I’ll figure it out. Go to bed.” This time, Jamie is pretty sure Lily _is_ blushing, thanks to the light from her wand.

“Evans, don’t be absurd,” says Jamie, rolling her eyes as she digs through her trunk. “It’s late, and you don’t know the castle as well as I do. You’ll get caught, get detention, then _cry_ ,and I’ll feel like absolute shite about it. So shut up and get underneath here.” 

_Here_ being her invisibility cloak that Jamie manages to find underneath a pile of sweaters she hasn’t worn in a while. Almost as though _someone_ knew she would need a few extra moments of arguing with Evans to get her way. 

“Your best mate is the absurd one,” Lily snaps back. The comeback loses a little of its bite when she ducks under the cloak with a somewhat surprising lack of argument. “Fine. Then, let’s go.”

They’re standing nearly nose to nose.

Sunkissed skin to freckle-scattered porcelain. 

Jamie, who is fairly certain she’s stopped breathing, notices, not for the first time, that they’re nearly the same height. Perhaps, Lily is an inch or two below her, and the thought causes a million little butterflies to burst and flutter in her stomach. 

She swallows. 

“Let’s go.”

\--

Where the hell is it?

Lily knows, with absolute certainty, that she put it in its proper place that morning. It was under her pillow, where she’s kept it every day. 

She tears apart her bed, her trunk, and then her bed again. Sitting in the wreckage of her search, Lily wonders how she’s ever going to get to sleep that night.

On a third check of her bedside table, Lily finds a hastily written note that she knows didn’t come from anyone who sleeps there. She should probably ignore it when she’s in the middle of a frantic nighttime search, but it catches her eye.

She knows she didn’t put it there. 

Even though she has no idea where it came from, the handwriting looks familiar. Actually, it looks far _too_ familiar. Lily narrows her eyes in suspicion. If she’s right, there’s a whole other series of questions. How did he manage to get up here? Did he have anything to do with…?

_I have what you seek in the room you must seek._

Any other question is eclipsed by the biggest one. How did he know?

Her suspicions, or at least part of them, are almost immediately confirmed by her conveniently awake roommate (or… whatever they are now). 

Was that also part of the plan? 

Of course, _of course_ , Sirius Black is the one responsible for Lily’s inability to sleep.

The next time she sees him, Lily is going to have more than a few choice words for him. Dragging her out of bed isn’t enough, apparently. Taking her things isn’t enough, clearly. He has to drag a decent dose of embarrassment into it. Lily is sure that he’s set more of this into motion than she’ll ever know.

As much as she would like to be able to take on the mission alone, Jamie makes some compelling points. She is the best person in the castle if you want to get somewhere without anyone else knowing about it. The invisibility cloak doesn’t hurt.

The thought of said roommate figuring out what is causing her to sneak out of the dormitory this late is something she has to push aside for the moment. That’s a problem she’ll solve once they get past the first problem. 

So, now, she finds herself with her shoulder pressed against Jamie’s, tiptoeing down an abandoned corridor with the invisibility cloak thrown over them both.

Luckily (or unluckily, maybe), Jamie is close enough that she barely has to make any noise. She might not be able to see them, but Lily is sure that Mrs. Norris can detect the faintest trace of students out of bounds. “Where exactly is this room of hidden things?” 

“Just a bit further,” says Jamie. Lily’s fairly certain that the other girl is smirking. The feeling of having something to prove grows in her chest, but she can’t decide what that something is. “Scared, Evans?”

Goosebumps prickle across her arms, but Lily blames her quick exit from the dorm without a sweater rather than the person beside her. “Of what?” she replies, determined to appear confident. “The tapestries?” 

“‘The tapestries,’”snorts Potter. She shakes her head, the mass of raven hair whipping around wildly, prompting Lily to catch the smell of peppermint shampoo. “You really are so funny, Lily.”

The corner of her mouth turns up, but their positions probably don’t allow Jamie to see it. “Speaking of tapestries,” she says, peering down the seventh floor corridor, “is that the one you mentioned?” From her angle it looks like it could be some trolls doing a twisted variation of ballet.

“Yep. That’s the one. Good ole Barnabas.” 

Jamie turns ever so slightly, the light of Lily’s wand illuminating the other girl’s profile in the darkness. She tries not to notice the way Jamie crinkles her nose in amusement, the same way she used to when Lily said something she didn’t want to admit was funny.

Swallowing, Lily lets herself watch Jamie's expression in the wand light. “What do we do now?” They're nose to nose again, and that makes it slightly harder to breathe regularly.

But it must just be the peppermint shampoo Jamie insists on using.

“You walk by it three times and think of the thing you’re missing. That you need to find it. Simple enough.”

_Simple enough._

Except Sirius Black is involved, so the chances of it being simple are slim to none. 

“Great,” Lily answers, ducking out from underneath the cloak. If Sirius has set some trap for her, she might as well find out what it is sooner rather than later.

Plus, it’s easier to think when they aren’t close enough to touch.

“Good luck,” says Jamie. Although Lily can no longer see her from under the protection of the cloak, she knows the other girl well enough to hear the smirk in her voice.

If it’s so simple, like she claims, she doesn’t need Jamie for this part. Lily straightens, tosses her braid over her shoulder, and creates a mental picture. She paces the hall once, twice, three times, forcing the thought to the forefront of her mind. 

_I need to find it so I can get to sleep._

After the third pass of the corridor, she spins around expectantly. Since nothing changed, she turns accusingly to the place where she left Jamie standing under the cloak. “I don’t understand your game, but it’s _not_ funny, Potter.”

It feels a little silly to be glaring at nothing.

There’s an almost rippling movement through air. Suddenly, the cloak is dropped and Jamie is standing closer than she thought, causing Lily to take a startled step backwards.

“You’re probably just not doing it right,” says Jamie with a stupid eyebrow cocked. “What did you think of?”

Oh, absolutely not. She’s not planning on telling _anyone_ why this is important enough to risk detention. Jamie might very well be the _last_ person she wants to tell. 

“That’s personal,” she answers automatically, feeling heat race to her face. It keeps doing that tonight, and she curses her pale skin for trying to give away any of her secrets. She looks back at the blank stretch of wall as an excuse to hide her cheeks from Jamie. “Maybe it’s broken.”

“It’s not _broken,_ Evans. The room can’t be broken. You’re just not being specific enough, I’m sure. Walk by it again. This time, think of _exactly_ what you’re trying to find.”

She stops herself from giving a sharp reply and moves to the other end of the hall, away from Jamie and her stupid crooked smirk. “Fine.” 

Again, she tries holding her chin proudly and facing the wall. This time, however, she closes her eyes for a few seconds before starting to pace, as if that’s the only way to hold onto the image in her mind.

When she turns this time, there isa door where it was once a blank wall. 

Lily punches the air in victory. Maybe Sirius Black isn’t as clever as he thinks. “Yes!” The sound feels louder since they’ve been talking in whispers this whole time, so Lily claps a hand over her mouth. She looks over toward Jamie, eyes wide over her hand.

“Okay, settle down, you dork,” says Jamie, though she’s grinning. “Open the door, and let’s go get whatever it is that’s important enough to keep me from my beauty sleep.” 

When Lily lowers her hand, it’s difficult to hide her new smile. “You don’t have to come along with me.” 

“Of course I do,” says Jamie, rolling her eyes. She’s leaning against a wall in a way that’s far more casual than Lily could ever hope to be. “I’ve come this far.”

She looks away to take the handle and pull the door open. As soon as she does, the floor feels as though it’s tilting from underneath her. It pitches them both forward, causing Lily and Jamie to end up tangled together on the floor, and snaps the door shut behind them.

Lily scrambles upright, dusting herself off and looking around. “You said it was the room of hidden things.” She tries for a note of authority in her voice, but it sounds more like an edge of panic to her own ears. “But I don’t see your -” She shakes her head and starts over. “I don’t see any hidden things.”

There’s nothing.

Nothing aside from an empty room and another door that leads to Merlin knows where.

“Maybe we did it wrong,” says Lily. “Open the door and we’ll try again.”

Lily watches as Jamie, for once in her life, does as she’s told, but the door doesn’t budge. The handle itself doesn’t even move. 

“What the fuck?” growls Jamie, tugging as hard as she can on the door. “It’s stuck!”

“It can’tbe stuck!” cries Lily. “We just used it to get in!”

“Do you want to try, Evans?” snorts Potter, gesturing at the door. “Be my guest.”

Instead of pulling on the same door, Lily turns to the one inside of the room. “Maybe this one leads out,” she offers, injecting her voice with false positivity.

When she tugs on that handle, it doesn’t budge either. 

Lily could positively scream. 

The combination of the time of night and situation hits her. She’s trapped in some mystery room in the middle of the night with her… whatever they are. She doesn’t _quite_ scream, but it’s closer than she would like. 

“I don’t - I don’t understand,”says Jamie. She truly sounds at a loss. As though, for the first time in Jamie Potter’s life, someone has one-upped her. “Normally, it’s a room _full_ of things. Not - not _this._ ”

“What do you mean, you ‘don’t understand?’” There is definitely panic in Lily’s tone now. If Jamie doesn’t know the way out of this trick, who does? 

At least now, they have a door keeping her rising voice away from the vigilant ears of Filch. That’s the _only_ good thing she can see about their new position. “He’s _your_ best mate. Don’t you, like, read each other’s minds or something?”

“Trust me,”growls Jamie, pacing back and forth, “I have absolutely no cluewhat he was thinking with this one. The last thing I wanted was to be out in the middle of the night, stuck inside this bloody room with you.”

Jamie’s reaction is almost a relief. 

The flame in her chest isn’t just a wild spark anymore. There’s a reason for it that’s not just because of the way Jamie wrinkles her nose or looks at her. It’s infuriating to be the only angry person in the room while Jamie just smirks at her like her temper is amusing. 

Unlike Jamie, Lily is rooted in her annoyance. “And you think I want to be here?” She stands her ground, and it makes it easier than it was before to look at the other girl. “I just wanted to go to bed!”

Jamie wheels around, her hair flying wildly. It’s impossible to look away from her. “Then why didn’t you just go to bed? I’mnot the reason we’re stuck in this room right now. I’m not the reason you couldn’t just go to sleep!”

 _This_ is more like the Jamie she knows from a few months ago. The one who she can say anything to and know that there isn’t judgement on the other side. The one who sees the ugly sides of her and laughs. The one who can take her temper and tell her when she’s out of line.

Not the one who steps around her like any wrong move will set off her alarm. 

Lily’s hands tighten at her side. “No, _you_ must have told Sirius some way to get up the stairs so he could nick something from mytrunk!” 

“Why in Merlin’s name would I do that? I would never let Sirius in our dorm to snoop through your stuff!”

There isn’t room for that excuse in her mind right now. She’s stuck here, and it has to be someone’s fault. She’s been too obvious, Jamie knows something, and this is some convoluted way of telling her that. “Then how did he know what to take?”

“How am I supposed to know? You won’t even tell me what it is that he even took! And I thought - I mean…” Jamie pauses, running a hand through her long hair and peering down at the ground. “I know we aren’t exactly as closeas we once were, but I thought you still trusted me enough to tell me what it is exactly that my arse of a best mate took from you. It’s hard to help you when you’re keeping secrets.”

“Don’t turn this back on me. This is about you and your best mate thinking it’s funny to mess with my head!”

“When have I ever pranked you or played a joke at _your_ expense? Everything I’ve ever done is _for_ you! To make you laugh!”

“That’s not - that’s not true!”

Jamie laughs, the sound of it nearly shrill and mocking. “Oh, you don’t like that? Or do you just not like _me_?”

“For some reason, I _do_ like you! I wouldn’t even be here right now, if it wasn’t for you! You’re the one who gave it to me in the first place!”

With that, Lily turns on her heel and pulls insistently on the door handle. It doesn’t budge or make any sound to indicate that she’s going to get it open anytime soon. She gives another desperate tug before dropping her forehead against the wood. 

In vain, she takes a deep breath and tries to count to ten. There has to be some way out, but Lily doesn’t have any ideas. When attempting to calm herself doesn’t work, she turns and slides down so she’s sitting with her back to the door, head in her hands.

\--

Jamie hasn’t spoken in nearly ten minutes which, honestly, is likely some sort of record for her. 

She feels as though she’s somehow said too much and not enough during their argument as she silently takes in Lily’s crumpled form across the room from her. 

She knows a line has been crossed, though she isn’t certain who drew it in the sand first. But, she knows that she’s the one who overstepped it. She’s _always_ the one who oversteps. 

She’s never been one for lines. Walking them and not being able to cross them. That’s not Jamie’s style. 

It’s why she is a Marauder. 

It’s why she’s become an animagus for her friend.

It’s why she kissed Lily two months ago after a night of sipping on firewhiskey and telling each other secrets into the early hours in the morning. 

Kissing Lily, admitting that she had - _has -_ feelings for the girl, _that_ had been a line worth crossing. At least, she had thought that two months ago.

Now, she isn’t sure. Not with the silence that followed afterwards. Not with the way Lily’s eyes would look everywhere _but_ toward Jamie whenever they were forced to share a space. Not with the way Lily’s body is currently starting to slightly shake with soundless sobs. 

She would rather have never kissed her, to never have even stepped a toe over that line, if she knew that it would lead to _this._

This space between friendship and _nothing._

“What’s wrong?” asks Jamie, unable to help herself any longer. 

She’s even less for silences. She would rather fight with Lily, have the air filled up with her fire, than drown in her sobs. 

Lily looks up and swipes the back of her hand under her eye. She looks at her, _really_ looks at her, for the first time in nearly two months before disappearing behind her hands. “I’m just… tired.” And she sounds it, but there’s something else.

“You’re lying,” says Jamie, almost with a tone of amusement in her voice. When Lily shakes her head, she presses on. “You _are._ Or, at least, you aren’t telling me everything. And you know how I know? You can only look at me for a moment before you have to look away. You can’t even lookat me properly anymore, Lily.”

Maybe it’s just an attempt to prove her wrong, but Lily peers up from her knees. 

“You’re right,” she says after a few seconds, so quietly that combining it with what she says makes Jamie hardly believe it actually happened. “It’s all my fault, and…” Her voice breaks and her shoulders shake again, but she leans back against the door rather than crumpling in on herself.

“Hey,” says Jamie, alarmed now and feeling a bit like an arse. She stands, crossing the room towards Lily, and wonders if this is another line she’s walking. “It’s not - don’t be silly. It’s not your fault at all. We wouldn’t even behere if it weren’t for Sirius.”

Jamie sits next to Lily, slouched over her knees in a way her mother would disapprove. She tugs on the laces of her Converse, trying hard not to let her fingers reach out to brush some of Lily’s hair that’s freed itself from her braid behind her ear. 

She doesn’t like questioning herself for wanting to comfort - to _touch_ \- Lily. She doesn’t like feeling as though she can’t touch her. 

To have to pretend that she doesn’t think about what her touch does to Lily. To not know if it would have the same effect as it once did. 

She wonders if Lily would still lean into her touch, the way she did the night she cupped her face and kissed her, tasting the firewhiskey on her breath. 

More than anything she knowsthat she’s a fool for wanting to try touching her again, knowing that it would possibly mean getting burnt by her flames. 

So why does she want to?

Lily laughs, weakly, but she’s also crying again. Tears drip onto her lap, but her shoulders have stopped shaking with repressed sobs. With her eyes on her hands, she looks small. Nothing like the defiant Lily Evans that Jamie is used to seeing. 

“I’m such an idiot,” she admits, not bothering to wipe her face again. “And now we’re stuck here, because Sirius _knows_.”

“Knows what?” asks Jamie, sitting up just slightly and raising her eyebrows. “I don’t understand.”

“That I can’t let go.” Lily shakes her head. “I tried, Jamie. I really, really tried.”

Today must be some special day for records because, for one of the first times, Jamie doesn’t have a quick response on hand. She watches Lily, not willing to believe that she could be talking about the same thing Jamie can’t stop thinking about.

“I thought that if I shut everything out and just focused on - on being _normal_ , it would all be okay. If I could just be your _friend_ and not shove all of my... But all I managed to do was push everyone away. To push _you_ away.”

“Hey now,” says Jamie, wondering if patting Lily on the back would be awkward. When she tries it, she finds that it is, indeed, an awkward thing to do. 

_Fuck her._

“You didn’t - you didn’t push me away. You could never do that. Besides it was - it _is_ my fault.”

Lily lets out a bitter laugh. “You’re not the pathetic one who can’t sleep without an old shirt from a girl you kissed _once_.”

“I - _what?”_

Jamie is certain that she must have misheard Lily. 

That she couldn’t _possibly_ mean that the reason that they’re out this late at night is because the thing that Lily is missing - the thing she can’t sleepwithout - is an old Quidditch shirt that Jamie gave her a long time ago. 

“Now everything’s messed up. Sirius won’t even _talk_ to me anymore, and you act like I have the plague or something. And it’s all because I’m the idiot who doesn’t understand what a firewhiskey kiss is and - and…” Lily keeps talking, as if she doesn’t notice how Jamie is sitting beside her, completely shocked into silence. “I lost my shirt. I lost my friends. I lost _you_.” 

Jamie is searching her brain desperately, trying to find something, _anything_ ,to say. 

That Lily hasn’t lost her. That she could never lose her. That she spends every waking moment stealing glances at her. That she _loves_ her.

Has always loved her. 

Perhaps always will love her.

But, before she can say any of those things, there’s a groaning sound that causes both of them to start. The door on the inside of the room is opening. 

“What on _earth?”_

The girls stand, Jamie placing a hand in front of Lily in the event that the door should hold something entirely unplanned by Sirius. 

Moments pass. When nothing similar to a troll or dragon appears, they simply look at each other once more. 

Nose to nose. 

Lily blinks first by taking a tentative step toward the now-open door. When a beat passes and, still, nothing pops out to surprise them, she takes a larger step past the threshold. A few seconds later, she’s out of the door, which snaps shut behind her, with a scarlet and gold bundle clutched to her chest that has to be Jamie’s old Quidditch shirt. 

She’s standing a few feet away, eyes locked on Jamie. She’s hesitating, standing on the edge. Absolutely beautiful and almost _vulnerable_. Lily’s clearly thinking about what to say next, and it occurs to Jamie that she still hasn’t said anything in response to Lily’s confession.

“It’s okay, Jamie,” Lily says after a few seconds. “If you don’t feel… I don’t expect you to. I’ll - I’ll figure it out. How to be a better friend and - and deal with this at the same time.” 

Lily looks down at the shirt, seems to make a decision, and holds it out to her. 

“What?” Jamie blinks down at the shirt, not daring to touch it. As though, if she does, Lily’s confession will be meaningless. “You think that I - that I don’t… Evans, Christ.I’m in _love_ with you. I have been since before our kiss. Since the moment we came back to school sixth year and you tore into me for setting a bunch of dungbombs loose on some first years. I don’t - I don’t _want_ to be just friends. I want to be a whole lot more than friends.” 

There’s a few more long seconds of silence, where Jamie can literally watch Lily’s eyes widen in response to her confession. In between blinks, time speeds up again, so fast that she doesn’t notice Lily close the space between them. 

“I don’t want to be just friends either.”

Then, Lily Evans is kissing her, actually _kissing_ her, and Jamie is sure that there’s no firewhiskey involved this time. 

And, _really,_ this is so much better. 

The first kiss was like dipping her toes into a pool, unsure and barely breaking through the surface. But this one - _this one -_ is like plunging in head first, submerging herself in Lily, and feeling the ripples going down her spine. 

Stripped of the firewhiskey, Lily tastes almost _sugary._ She’s sweet. Jamie can’t help but nibble on her bottom lip to get a taste. 

Lily’s mouth opens, allowing Jamie to explore and take charge. Allowing Jamie’s tongue to dance and brush against her own. She feels certain she can fly, can simply float away, if she lifts her feet from the ground. 

They pull apart, breathless, their foreheads resting against each other. 

And Jamie, ever the eloquent one, says the one thing that comes to mind.

_“Fuck.”_

Lily laughs again. 

This time, it’s a soft melody, instead of the dissonant clash of her earlier attempts. “Maybe later.” She’s teasing her, actually teasing her, for the first time since their first kiss, and it’s the best thing that’s happened to her all day.

Well, not quite. 

Unless the clock slipped past midnight without her noticing and she gets to have her first whole day as Lily’s… whatever they are.

Lily’s fingers play with the edge of Jamie’s sweater for a moment before moving upwards to cup the girl’s face and, if that wasn’t distracting enough, her lips are temptingly close to her jawline. “So, if we’re not ‘just friends,’” she whispers, catching Jamie with her green eyes, “what does that make us?”

“Well,” grins Jamie, placing a kiss on the pulse point of Lily’s wrist, ”that depends. What are you doing during the Hogsmeade visit next weekend?”

“I think I have a date,” Lily answers, shifting forward to close the space between them again, “with my girlfriend.”

**Author's Note:**

> Check us out on tumblr @women-inthe-sequel and @alrightginger!


End file.
